Liberalism and Crime: The British Experience

Description

In Liberalism and Crime, Robert Sullivan offers an alternate way of looking at liberalism, using the usurpation of the welfare state in Britain by a free market-oriented economy as his crucible. Not content with the academic interpretation of liberalism as an offshoot of analytic philosophy, Sullivan has woven together a convincing demonstration that liberalism is born out of an alternative approach-one based in active thought and reasonable argument. The tapestry of this study touches on the breakup of British Marxism, the influence of crime on British polity, and the arguments of Ronald Clarke against "medical criminology." Shifting societal responsibility onto the individual citizen, this new, alternative, model of liberalism was fully ushered in by the rise of Margaret Thatcher and continued with Tony Blair and the New Labour movement in the 1990s. Because similar shifts occurred in the United States simultaneously, this argument should be of interest to both general American and British readers, as well as academics in political theory, cultural studies, criminology, and British studies.

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About Author

Robert R. Sullivan is Professor Emeritus at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

Contents

Chapter 1 A Thumbnail Sketch of Recent British Criminal Justice Part 2 The Autonomous Individual Chapter 3 The Revolt of British Criminology in the 1970s Chapter 4 The Autonomous Individual the Reasoning Criminal Part 5 The Power of the State Chapter 6 The "Nothing Works" Argument in Britain Chapter 7 The Police and the Birmingham's Centre's Critique Chapter 8 The Multiagency Approach to Situational Crime Control Chapter 9 The Persistence of the State in British Policing and Prisons Part 10 The Rule of Law Chapter 11 The Warwick School's Challenge and the Rule of Law Chapter 12 Radzinowicz's Empire and the Rule of Law